Adam Serwer and Colorlines' Channing Kennedy are not pleased with Christopher Nolan's decision to cast actor Tom Hardy as the villain Bane in his next Batman film. Serwer thinks Bane is too dull to stand as a central villain (at least compared to Ras Al Ghul and the Joker), while Kennedy sees this as another instance of Hollywood's white-washing:
In other words: Bane is Latino! And Bane’s been Latino, being voiced at different points in the animated series by Danny Trejo and Hector Elizondo. [...]
So why, in the franchise’s most critically-lauded manifestation, give the role to a white dude? It’s not as though Hollywood is so bristling with scripts featuring supergenius Latinos with complicated backstories that this one can get a pass.
Nobody doubts that Nolan and Hardy will do great things with the character; Nolan can do no wrong after The Dark Knight and Inception, and Hardy played a not-dissimilar role as real-life British prisoner Charles Bronson. But so what? Why not take advantage of this perfectly canonical opportunity to give audiences a Latino actor playing a complex Latino character (i.e. not a gardener) in a blockbuster film? It seems unlikely that Nolan couldn’t find a single Latino actor in a city that used to be inside Mexico.
I won't contest the argument that Bane is a boring character -- you can only do so much with a strongman in a silly mask -- but I will (gently) take issue with Kennedy's assertion that this is an unfortunate bit of white-washing, on par with Hollywood's adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender and Prince of Persia.
Basically, I think we need to make a distinction between ethnic/white characters, and characters that happen to be ethnic/white. Peter Parker is a character who happens to be white; his core attributes -- working-class upbringing, deep sense of responsibility, shitty boss, shaky relationships -- are race-neutral. A black Peter Parker is possible for the simple reason that his race is irrelevant to the character. On the flip side, you couldn't have a white Storm or a black Wonder Woman; both characters are tied to their ethnic identities in important ways. Storm was an African rain goddess before she was a member of the X-Men, and Diana is an Amazon and a product of Greek mythology. Likewise, in the case of Avatar, the series takes place in a pan-Asian world, and is deeply influenced by Asian mythologies; there literally are no white people in the world of Avatar.
By contrast, I don't think Bane's ethnicity is integral -- or even important -- to his character. This might just be the poor writing and characterization that has marked his tenure in the DC Universe, but Bane's biographical details -- his upbringing in a Caribbean prison, for instance -- are mostly irrelevant. Indeed, his background is so flexible that DC writers have played games with his parentage, at one point suggesting that his father is Thomas Wayne, father of Bruce. The important things about Bane are his intelligence, his strength, his drug addiction, and his ruthlessness. His ethnicity is mostly a second-order concern.
That said, even if Bane doesn't need to be Latino, it's a fair point to say that -- with the abundance of interesting roles for white dudes -- why not cast Bane as a Latino, while dispensing with the other ancillary elements of his canonical background? If I were casting a Batman movie, I might make that choice. As it stands, Bane will be a white guy, and I just don't see that as much of a problem.
-- Jamelle Bouie
